Lighting Examples: Rembrandt

This is our footage of when we attempted to produce the Rembrandt lighting technique, we tried to adjust the brightness of the key light and the position of the reflector to try and discern what effects it had on the images appearance, as well as how effectively we could produce this lighting technique. The way you can determine that this technique is Rembrandt lighting is that half of the subjects face is un-illuminated but has a small triangular piece of light under the subjects eye to highlight their features a small amount.



Rembrandt light ex from Lewis Mercer on Vimeo.

This footage contains elements of new wave as it is shot in high contrast monochrome, much like the films of the French new wave, the lighting used creates a stark contrast between highlights and shadow on the subject, which this technique is often used in French new wave films due to it also only requiring one light source so it is ideal for a small budget. This technique can be seen, if not vaguely in Francois Trauffants film "the 400 Blows", the subjects face is only half illuminated with a small triangle of light on the un-illuminated side.